Gray - your turn!

Gray -
I don't write down NEARLY enough of the little boy you are and the hysterical things you do, so I'm stopping today - as you and your sister nap - and trying to capture just a glimpse of who you are as a boy so your wife can read about you in 35 years.

Here's the boy I see -

1. For starters, you're hysterical.  You are now almost 3 and your vocabulary is just growing by the day and the way your mind works is so manipulative...I mean smart :).  You negotiate constantly.  I will say something like, "Gray, time to go get dressed" and you, without missing a beat, will respond, "Grayson go get dressed, then come downstairs and watch a show and have a snack, then go to park and later to the museum...does that sound like fun, mommy????" - literally, you will say all that.  I was simply looking for a "yes ma'am" but you have now mapped out your day with the sweetest voice and tone and in complete seriousness.  If you're wondering how I respond, it's typically with a smirk, "let's go upstairs and get dressed and afterwards we'll talk about the rest of our day." 

2. You love, love, love to eat.  I won't lie - there are times your dad and I wonder if we need to up the greens and lower the carbs in your diet.  Mostly just when we tuck in your cream color dress shirt to your pants with no belt and it's the end of the day.  You got a little Homer Simpson in you at that time of night.  The other day (now month) we were at our friend's William and Hudson's house and your friend Johnathan was there too.  William and Johnathan were being bribed to eat just one bite of their sandwich and I turned and looked at you as you proceeded to shove the entire last quarter of your sandwich in your mouth, had completely finished all your pretzels and hummus and were looking to help your friends finish off their lunches.   You also may or may not have squeezed your first poop into the potty because you were trying SO hard to pee in the potty again so you could get more m n m's.  Well, you didn't pee again but because you pooped you got m n m's AND a new special toy.  Your dad wondered if that counted as your first poop but I gave it to you.

3. On that note - you always refer to yourself in third person and it's totally my fault.  Instead of saying "you" I always say "Grayson" and instead of saying "I," I always say "Mommy" - I'm working on it - hopefully we'll have it fixed by high school.

4. You LOVE your friends.  You, at any given time in the day, will ask what Landon and Fields are doing and if we can go see them.  When we do see your friends you get so hyper you'd think I gave you a 5 hour energy before we arrived.  Seriously, something in you just goes bonkers and you are a ca-razy man and I love it. I love that you love your friends because that's how I feel inside when I am with my friends but I'm too old to act like that.  Live it up, my son - when you're with people you love..go crazy.  Here is a picture of you and your cousin, Haley - it's one of my favorites.

5. I love when we pray with you and the things you want to pray for.  You pray almost nightly for a train we heard one day a few months back at a park but we couldn't see it.  I don't know why you got obsessed but you did and now you pray for that train often.  I'm sure the conductor is thankful. Sometimes at dinner when your dad prays for the food he'll announce, "let's pray" and as he's praying for our food to nourish our bodies and I'm hoping he finishes quickly b/c Hazel is getting antsy to eat, you will take that opportunity to ask for prayer for your friends or for Am and Josh or anyone that is on your heart.  It's great to hear the pause in your dad's talking as he's thinking of the food getting cold but how can we not pray for the things you feel led to pray for.  He always prays for those things when you ask.  Just so you know though, you ask to pray for your cars and trains a lot...typically we just end up thanking God for cars and trains - we don't actually pray for them.  This happened the other night and you prayed for James and Thomas and Percy and so on and so forth.  Your dad kindly told you that we like to pray for PEOPLE and friends in our lives, not just trains, and you then just repeated your prayers for your trains and were confused as to why dad acted like your trains didn't have souls.  Silly daddy.

 ..
6. Barney songs.  I used to pride myself on the fact that I listened to my own music even when toting you around in the car.  I was dead set on having you request Sugarland or C-lo rather than "cheesy" kid songs.  Of course your dad got wind of that and bought you your first ever kid song cd and smiles often thinking of how I have lost my music battle.  I'm not gonna lie - it's brutal..but you love it.  You call it your 'barney songs' even though they have nothing to do with Barney.  The kids voices are so annoying and they say things like, "I know a great song we can sing about.....spaghetti!!!!!" and then another kid chimes in, "OH GOODIE, Sarah Lynn."  Turns out you have favorite songs, too.  When Row, Row, Row your boat comes on you politely ask to change the song - yet, we've learned that Eddie Bettie bo bettie...banana fanna fo fettie" is your jam.  You also LOVE to shake your sillies out and jump your jiggles out.  I wish often I could jump my jiggles out - it doesn't seem to be working.

7.  You LOVE hair - especially my hair.  I sometimes get worried you will end up on "crazy fetishes" - the new show on TLC.  You just love to touch and smell my hair.  I had some girls over for a bachelorette party a few months back and a few of them witnessed this addiction so they took a whiff themselves.  They did confirm my hair smells good - so you're not totally crazy - but I won't lie there are times when I wonder if I need to break you of this.

8. You ADORE your sister.  Especially now as she can sit up and play you always want her around.  You cry if I take her somewhere and you don't get to come.  You love to just play with her.  Often times this ends up with her being COVERED in stuffed animals or toys and we have to talk about what is happening but I do think you're trying to love her.  I may or may not have dumped an entire basket of train tracks on your lap the other day so that you could physically feel what she is feeling when you put loads of toys right on top of her, but I digress.  I think this goes with the one above about you loving your friends. You just want to be with people - I ADORE that.  She's eating more and more now and after every meal you look at her and say, "Hazel, you're a mess, sweet girl"  She's crawling now and I think that you prefer she doesn't.  As much as you adore her she brings you MUCH anxiety.  Always worried about where she's headed or what toy she's going to get.  You look ahead to find the toy she could want and you run to grab it.  We know WHY you are doing this but you typically play it off like you're trying to protect her from getting hurt.  It's quite genius.  One of your favorite things is to sit with her in her crib after baths and before bed.  I can't wait until she can actually play so you have your little partner in crime. I love your love for her as it reminds me of Uncle Jason's love for me and vice versa - it's such a gift.

9. You've got some of your mom in you and you worry..a LOT. You worry about things that we don't even know where the fear comes from and then other worries, like your fear of Hazel now pooping in the bath with you is quite legit and you have grounds to stand on as she did in fact let loose in the bubble bath the other night while you were in there with her - but unfortunately you can't let things go.  Your dad told me a story from just this past Saturday when he was leaving to meet me for a night of dancing and you were a little hesitant about the sitter as it was someone we don't have over often.  You were a little clingy when your dad starting getting ready to go but he asked you to open the door for him.  So, as you love to do - you ran to the door and opened it for dad to leave and he was thinking it was going to be a long, drawn out process with lots of tears and reassurance needed, but apparently he took one step out the door and you slammed it shut while yelling, "DON'T WANT THE DONKEYS TO GET ME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!" - and that was your goodbye.  You have a fear of donkeys and a fear of moths and although I should NOT encourage either of these, sometimes when you're letting the heat out it's the only thing that works :).


10. I just adore you like you wouldn't believe. You teach me DAILY about lots of things - sometimes patience, sometimes forgiveness, sometimes love..but today you taught me about grace.  We were at the doctor's office to get Hazel's ears checked and you were being the opposite of obedient while we were there.  The whole time you were disruptive, loud, and disobedient.  Of course my pride took a beating as I felt I was an inadequate mom in front of the pediatrician (you typically don't do well when we are there so it's a reoccurring event).  So, I proceeded to act in fact less mature then you were acting and I raised my voice to you and disciplined you with still some anger in me when we got home.  Once everything calmed down and I finally melted I came to you to ask for your forgiveness.  I said, "are you mad at me, buddy?? are you mad at mommy??" and you just said, "no silly mommy, I'm not mad at you, you didn't be rude at the doctor's and I'm not mad at you." and I said, "will you forgive me, buddy for yelling at you?" and you responded, "I forgive you, mommy..you weren't bad at the doctor's office." - I was so convicted on how angry I was at you and then when I released that on you, you didn't seem to have one feeling of anger towards me. You showed me so much grace. Oh, to have your maturity at times.  Thank you for the lesson and showing me Jesus today.

I love you, buddy.  I can't wait to keep learning about who the Lord has created you to be.

Always,
Momma